The Endless Tide
by writerfan2013
Summary: Henry and Jo are stuck. But they know they need each other, and now there's a new mystery which perhaps only Henry Morgan can solve. But dare he give Jo his trust? HenryxJo, probably slight AU or at the start of the series as that's where I'm up to! A quick one, let me know what you think! You may also like 'A man of many endings', about Henry and a rather famous detective... -Sef
1. Chapter 1

The sea was rough in Henry's dreams tonight, pitching him forrard and aft in a storm of creaks and groans. Men shouted; oak strained and bowed; calico sail whipped back and forth. The cries of the slaves were smothered beneath the wind's howl, and salt water drenched Henry's face.

He opened his eyes onto his bedroom in the twenty-first century and sat up. He had wept in his sleep, again. What did it mean?

His watch showed early morning. Henry shook himself and rose. He would note the tears in his journal, later, and see if there was a pattern to this new phenomenon, although none presented itself.

Meanwhile, he was in New York, it was a cold February day, and there was work, blessed work, that allowed escape from his trap of rejuvenating flesh for a time. At work, calculating the history of deaths, he could be a mind set free, and forget his long, long past.

Ten hours later Henry was exhausted and ready for home. His antiques shop soothed him, made him feel young and old at once, which was the strange truth, and perhaps tonight he would have a glass or two of aged wine to dull the loneliness and send him off to sleep.

Reaching for his coat, he congratulated himself wryly on surviving another day, before the scrape of the door made him look up to see Jo Martinez wearing her black coat and gleaming badge. She was as striking as ever, with her bold eyes, and lips the colour of a ripening fig, fresh from the Indies, but now she was glowering at him. And at once Henry knew that something was very wrong.

* * *

"Where's John Doe 1984?" Jo asked, striding into the examination room. The medical examination room was depressing, as usual, but Henry Morgan, ME to the NYPD, was immune.

Henry said, "Good afternoon, detective."

He always greeted her that way. In conversation he called her Jo, but for hellos and goodbyes she was her title. It was his way of keeping her at a distance, she guessed. Whenever there was a danger that the two of them might progress from being colleagues to friends, or more, the formality appeared, pushing her gently back.

"Henry, hi. We have a problem."

"John Doe 1984 is in the mortuary awaiting clearance for cremation." Henry put on his coat, buttoning it precisely, as if it were one of his instruments. "The parachute-type apparatus has gone to Evidence."

"What did he die of?"

"Old age," said Henry drily.

"What?"

"That and the eight hundred foot fall onto concrete and ice. But I think it was the age that got him in the end."

She shook off his attempts at humour. Why was Henry joking about it? He never wisecracked about death. She frowned at him. Slightly unshaven, the dark stubble tinged with silver; only a shadow of his usual regretful smile about the mouth; heaviness around the bright brown eyes: he was not sleeping, again. No clue why that brought out his sense of humour, but whatever. "Take me to him."

He inclined his head. and led the way. "What's wrong?"

"The Lieutenant called me in specifically about this one. Solve it quick. Because of the location."

"Ah yes. the location."

Most unidentified suicides do not take off from the top of the Rockefeller. The tourists skating below were equal parts traumatized and skilled with Instagram.

"The chief wants us to redouble our efforts, that's your efforts, at finding his identity." Jo rolled her eyes.

"Very well."

Henry yanked open the drawer marked 1984. "Oh. Well, there we might indeed have a problem."

Jo peered in. "Oh."

The drawer was empty. The body was gone.


	2. Chapter 2

The hurricane of scandal whistled through the precinct, scattering papers off desks and rear ends off seats. The chief was unimpressed at losing a body, any body, but especially this one. At last, the mystery still unsolved, Henry was given leave to go home.

"I'll give you a ride," Jo said. "I don't mean to be blunt, but you look terrible."

He smiled. Her directness was never malicious. Generally it saved time and misunderstandings. "Be as blunt as you need. I confess I am rather tired."

He settled into the passenger seat of her police issue Ford. The upholstery smelled of perfume, as if she routinely spritzed herself before getting out. No, he realised, picturing her climbing in, weary from a crime scene: she gave herself a little spray of La Vie Est Belle after she got into the car. It was a tonic, a removal of the taint of death.

Maybe he ought to try it. He would need a fair dose of it, in his job. Luckily he liked her favourite fragrance.

He lay back and watched Jo's hands on the wheel, slender wrists, elegant fingers. If he slid his gaze downwards, under cover of half-closed eyes, he could catch a glimpse of her right ankle, formal in sheer black hose, between her trouser hem and her sturdy black heels. He smiled then, and turned his face towards the passenger window. He always had been a fool for a pretty ankle.

Jo manoeuvered through heavy winter traffic, noticing a dusting of snow in Brooklyn's lesser streets, and pulled up at last close to Henry's antiques shop. "Well, see you tomorrow," she said, and turned to see Henry flaked out beside her, his face soft and slack, his breath coming in a slow, deep rhythm like waves breaking on a remote shore.

She sighed. He worked too hard. Well, so did she, but she was tough. There was a frailty to Henry Morgan, a weakness he tried to hide, and she wished she could persuade him that he could trust her.

She lay her hand on his shoulder to wake him, and he stirred and mumbled, "The ship," and a tear ran down his cheek.

Shocked, she drew back, but he opened his eyes and blinked. "Jo," he said. still blurry.

"Yeah."

He wiped his eyes without embarrassment.

"Are you ok," she asked. The car was claustrophobic. Henry looked as dazed as if he'd been pulled from the wreckage.

"I'm perfectly fine -"

The radio cawed like a crow on a solitary tree. Jo picked up and listened. "Ok, we're on it. -Another John Doe," she said to Henry. "Would you mind-?"

"Not at all."

"I'll drop you back here as soon as you've done your thing," she said. "Promise."

"I know you will," he said.

As they re-entered rush hour traffic, she said, "Were you dreaming about a ship?"

She kept her eyes forward and tried to be matter of fact. It still seemed very personal. She could just as well have asked about, unimaginable, his sex life.

He didn't reply, but watched the riverside lights from his window.

Fair enough. She hadn't really expected an answer anyway. Flakes filled the windshield and she switched on the wipers.

More snow. Good for preserving a body, terrible for ruining the evidence.

"I drowned once," Henry said.

He glanced at her. His eyes were wary.

"Drowned."

"Yes. I - I was brought back to life."

"I heard of that. Wow. That must be pretty..." What? "Horrible," she said. Lame. "I'm sorry," she added, far too late. "Does it give you nightmares?"

"It never has before. But lately...as you saw." He shrugged.

"It's ok," she said softly. "Everyone has issues."

For a moment Henry thought she would take his hand. But she was scowling at the road. And what would he have done if she had? "I'll find our missing John Doe," he said. "I swear it, Jo."

She blinked.

"Bodies don't just vanish," he said.

"That's for sure." Their little moment of intimacy was gone. A dream, that he might tell her what was really in his mind, or how she could help. She wondered if a big hug, preferably not whilst also driving, truly would fix him. Or maybe her.

What would it be like to kiss Henry Morgan? Old fashioned, she thought: courtesy ruling passion. Pretty romantic actually. Not that he would ever allow it. He had just used her first name twice in one conversation - that was where they were up to. Anything more would have to wait for him to be ready in, oh, about a hundred years.

She could be ready a little sooner, she thought. There was a decency and reticence about him that appealed to her. He was ... dependable. She knew he'd been married. He would have treated his wife properly. He wouldn't disappear from her life, no explanation, no reason.

She would like a man like that. One day. And if he would only let her in, she thought that Henry Morgan could do a lot worse than a woman like her.


	3. Chapter 3

The crime scene was not a crime scene. It was a small park and a smaller than usual crowd of gawpers, given the weather. "Suicide," said Hanson, lifting the tape.

"How do you know," Jo asked.

Hanson led them to where a body had been covered by a sheet.

"Gunshot wound to the head witnessed by the sobbing woman being comforted by paramedics," said Henry.

Hanson rolled his eyes. "Should I even bother pulling back the sheet? Or are you going to tell me his name and address first?"

Jo gestured for Hanson to show them the body.

"Oh," said Henry.

"Not possible," said Jo.

The face was mostly intact despite the ruin of the rest of the head. And It was unmistakably John Doe 1984.

* * *

"So John Doe has a twin," said Jo. She slurped coffee. "Both twins killed themselves. That's got to narrow it down, right?"

"Hmn," said Henry.

They were in the precinct, filing paperwork for this new death. The lights were dim. Most people had gone home. A few late workers had desk lamps on, casting pools of comfort like lights around a harbour.

"There must be birth records for white males around that age, showing if they were a twin. Is it on your birth certificate?" she asked.

"No," he said vaguely. His eyes were in some distant horizon.

"New one for you," said the night mortuary assistant, coming past. "Must be the day for it."

Henry leapt up. "No!"

"He's on the table," the guy called, but Henry was scrambling to the mortuary.

"Hey-" Jo grabbed her phone and went after him.

Henry went straight for the drawer containing the park suicide.

Jo went for the table.

"Dammit!" Henry's cry echoed from the mortuary. He strode through.

"Don't tell me. He's gone," said Jo. But how had Henry known?

Henry was grim. "Yes. And this in the table would be -"

"Their triplet," said Jo.

Henry looked down, assessing without needing to touch the deceased. "Another suicide. Painkiller overdose this time."

"This isn't possible, is it," said Jo.

"No," said Henry, but his mouth was twisted and Jo had never seen him so unhappy.

She went to him and touched his sleeve. "What is it ? You've seen this before, haven't you? What's going on?"

"I - can't say," he said. He staggered like a man in an overladen dinghy. "I have to go."

"I'll drop you home," she said, but he was already sprinting for the exit. "Henry!"

* * *

The last door crashed open onto the snowy parking lot. The weather had come in with nightfall, bringing white flakes swirling in headlamps and roads reflective and slick.

"Henry!"

He was there, a dark figure darting between cars in the parking lot, heading for the street. He must have heard her, the way snow deadens sounds and makes the world becalmed, but he didn't stop. With reckless haste he ducked between parked cabs and sought a gap in the rumbling traffic.

He looked right, saw it was clear, and stepped out. Except that traffic does not approach from the right in America, but from the left.

The pickup hit him a glancing blow and flung him hard into the slush. The truck careered to a halt and the driver hustled out, but Jo was already there.

"Henry. Oh my God. Henry, can you hear me?"

He was hurt. It was bad. The world dimmed and pulsed around her and all she saw was his face, and blood.

"Jo. Something I must tell you -"

"Hush, it can wait. Somebody call an ambulance!" She chafed his hands. biting her lip against the sight of blood leaking away into the snow.

"No. I've been meaning to tell you. A long time..." He coughed and she stroked his hair back, her hand coming away wet and red.

She was crouched over him. He could smell her warm perfume, see the care in her eyes. She was crying and trying not to, so as not to frighten him with how badly he was hurt. She was so strong and brave. He made another effort. She must not be left ignorant, not like this. "Jo. You have to know. About the bodies - the vanishing bodies -"

"I don't care about them," she said. "I care about you. Henry? Stay with me!"

"They. Are like me. I'm not alone," he said in three gasps, each word striking the surface like the debris of a wrecked ship, thrusting up above the waves for a tantalising moment, promising a raft, survival...then plunging back to the depths once more. "Jo. I am - " He grasped her hand and she gave a sob and shook her head. "It's all right," he said, and salt water ran from his eyes.

"The medics are on their way," called the truck driver.

"It's too late," said Jo, holding the hand of a man who had been her colleague and friend, and something else, something secret and dear. "Keep back!"

She wiped her eyes and sniffed. Henry's face looked peaceful, swept by light from passing cars. Light, dark, light, dark over his body like the beacon's signal from a rocky cliff. Jo knelt with her knees soaked and icy, and was aware of the crowd being moved back, of a siren approaching, but all she knew was that Henry, who she had thought so solid, had left her, just like everyone else. She moved to brush the strange tears from his cheek, pausing to let another headlamp beam light his face.

And then she jerked back and scrambled to her feet. Where Henry had lain was just empty pavement, and there was nothing to show he had ever been there - no blood, not even a tear.


	4. Chapter 4

Jo sat in the car on a graffittied side street with the engine running and the heater on full, shivering and forcing down thin swallows of sidewalk coffee.

After Henry vanished she ran. How could she explain? She couldn't, and so she hid in her car.

The coffee was vile. She held it off with her left hand and reached for her perfume. A couple of zaps of Lancome and she might feel more normal.

The cloud of fragrance was still drifting onto her skin when she heard her name from the radio. "Martinez."

The voice on the other end was gravelly and sardonic. "We got your partner here by Pier Four, Martinez. Naked, again. How many times is that now? And he says it's because he's been swimming."

There was laughter, and more mickey-taking, and Jo didn't hear any of it as she threw the coffee out of the window and wrenched the car into Drive.

* * *

It was him. It was definitely him. Henry was white-faced and rattling with cold, a blanket around his shoulders. And he was alive.

Jo abandoned the car, door hanging open, and took numb steps across the beach to where two cops were sniggering and Henry stood barefoot and silent. He turned his head towards her and she saw fear in his eyes - fear, from this man who had spent his last words reassuring her.

She stepped to him and slowly put her arms around him. He tensed. "I saw you die," she said.

"Yes." He was rigid with cold and fear, not hugging her back.

"But here you are."

"Yes." Would this moment be the last one where she thought he was sane? Where she trusted him in anything?

"Thank God," she said, and put her face to the scratchy wool covering his shoulder. "I thought I'd lost you too."

His arms came around her then. His fingers were cold in her hair. "I'm not so easy to get rid of."

"I guess not." She looked up at him. "But how?"

"It's a long story."

"I've got time."

He gave a short laugh. "I'm pleased to hear you say that."

She squeezed him tight. "Oh God Henry, you gave me a scare. But -you're alive!"

"And you're hugging a naked man in full sight of two police officers."

She spun round to see the two cops goggling at them. "You think they have arrest warrants?"

"I think they have smartphones and YouTube."

Jo snorted, and let go of him.

He gathered the blanket around him like a toga. "I'm not sure I'm ready for that level of notoriety. Can we please get into your car?"


	5. Chapter 5

The story, once told, was simple. Henry watched Jo's face while he spoke, and saw amazement and horror in her eyes, but no disbelief. It seemed his own stupidity in getting run over had been the easiest proof he could have devised.

They sat awhile, parked out of the streetlight on a quiet road next to Brooklyn Bridge Park.

"I think," Henry said, "that there is someone out there who is like me, but who has only recently become like me."

"He's trying out his immortality?"

Henry winced. "I think he's trying to die."

"So how do we find him? What do we do when we find him?"

Henry shrugged. "I don't know. Offer comfort, perhaps. It was comfort I most longed for when I realised the full truth of my condition."

"But you must have told somebody ... trusted somebody. " To be unwillingly alone was a curse. She knew. And Henry, with his sharp wit and gentle humour, how could he be alone?

He shook his head. "It never worked. And when you are alone, it is surprising how quickly you find that you have lived too long." He pulled the blanket more closely around his pale shoulders, keeping eye contact with her. "When you and I first met, I was looking for ways to die."

She went still. His secretiveness. His utter dedication to the causes of death. His reluctance to engage, to connect. It made sense now. "And now?" she asked, because he was gazing at her with yearning eyes.

He held out his hand, and she placed hers in it. "Now, I'm still looking. I must. But perhaps I'm not looking quite so hard."

He leaned across, asking permission with his eyes, and when she did not protest, touched his lips fleetingly to hers. Then, even as she registered his warm mouth and his scent of warm oak and fresh water, he put his arms around her and kissed her with a fierce strength she had never expected of him. It was like a first kiss after you'd given up expecting to dance, like vindication, like being rescued. She tangled her hands in his hair, then trailed her fingers over his bare back, discovering the scars of ancient injury. He was two hundred years old, but he was honest and warm and here in her front seat dragging his hands over her ribs and thighs with passionate intensity.

There was the tap of a flashlight on Jo's side window.

"Crap," said Jo, tugging at her blouse.

"Ah," said Henry. "Detective, I believe my blanket is somewhere in the driver's footwell, and we are both about to be arrested."


	6. Chapter 6

"I've passed John Doe's picture, blurry so you can't really see he's dead, to mental health services. They're going to watch out for him as a suicide risk. When they pick him up they'll notify me." Jo dropped her phone onto the Victorian writing desk and let out a long breath. "That's as much as we can do for now."

"That's good..." Henry yawned, and caught Jo doing the same.

They were, finally, back at Henry's place. It was almost dawn. Jo refused more coffee and insisted Henry go to bed. "You're dead on your feet."

He smirked.

"Oh my God. Funny guy. Just go!"

He grasped her hand and drew her up the stairs with him. "If I'm not to be alone with my secret, then I would like not to be alone in my bed." His eyes were sleepy but welcoming.

"You make a lot of assumptions, mister." But she was kicking off her shoes as he peeled back the sheet on a dark wood bed.

"I never thought I'd see you naked," she said. "And now twice in one day."

"Now you know my secret I may be calling on you to hoist me nude out of the waves every time I die." He was taking off his tie.

"Maybe you could avoid dying, as an easier option."

"Maybe I could."

She had imagined he might be pernickety and shy, but he threw his clothes on a chair and sprawled carelessly on the bed like any man. It was she who awkwardly sat on one side and fiddled with her buttons.

"There's no obligation," said Henry. "Only the imperative of sleep."

"I know."

He sat up and rummaged among his clothes. "Wear my shirt if you like."

He lay back on the pillows, eyes half closed, watching her contentedly. By the time she pulled her head through the shirt he was asleep.

He was miraculous. She settled down beside him, marvelling at how easy this felt, to be in his space. She stroked his forehead. His cotton shirt was crisp on her skin and she crushed it between them, wrapping him in her arms. He murmured, and pulled her close. "Jo..."

Her name was sweet in his voice, a hope, a promise. She smiled, her lips resting in the crook of his neck, and slept.

* * *

She slept long after he awoke, and he lay with one arm slowly numbing, watching the pale winter sun playing over her face and neck. She was smooth and finely made, every part begging to be caressed, to be lavished with care, but he could wait. To lie here, serene in her arms, was to be calm at anchor in a sunlit bay, and no danger, in these moments, could touch him. His secret was theirs now, and that trust had led easily to this.

There were no tears today. He supposed that meant something. Perhaps, being whatever he was, he had sensed the same change happening to someone else, their desperate John Doe. Or perhaps it was simpler than that, and he had just been more unhappy than he realised.

It didn't matter. He was alive, and Jo was here in his home, his very bed, and she had accepted him, cursed or blessed as he was. His mind drifted, moored in her arms but free, his thoughts tranquil at last, his long, long memories rising and falling away, following the ebb and flow of the endless tide.

* * *

**Author's note: **Please let me know what you think! I have been channelling my inner Hornblower this week, hence all the seafaring imagery. I hope you enjoyed this short 'big reveal' story and if you have any writerly feedback, I'd love to hear. Thanks. -Sef


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